Black and white and despatched again over: finish of panda diplomacy as Japan returns bears to China

[ad_1] T he panda home at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo isn't resulting from open for a number of hours, however guests are already milling round its entrance, pausing to pose for pictures in entrance of murals of the power’s most beloved residents. A brief stroll away the present store is doing a roaring commerce in themed souvenirs – from cuddly toys and stationery to T-shirts and biscuits.

The guests are right here to say goodbye to Xiao Xiao and Lei Lei. Early subsequent week, the dual pandas, born on the zoo in 2021 however technically on mortgage from China , will probably be flown out of Tokyo’s Narita airport to China, the place they'll bear quarantine and be reunited with their sister, Xiang Xiang, at a conservation and analysis centre in Sichuan province.

Their departure is not going to solely go away legions of Japanese admirers bereft; it is usually symptomatic of a dramatic deterioration in relations between China and their host nation.

Japan will probably be and not using a big panda for the primary time since 1972, when Tokyo and Beijing normalised diplomatic ties virtually three a long time after the top of the second world conflict.

Since then, China has loaned greater than 30 pandas – an endangered species – to zoos in Japan, the place they've endeared themselves to numerous animal lovers and precipitated anguish on their return.

Panda followers strolling previous merchandise on the Panda Home at Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo. {Photograph}: Justin McCurry/The Guardian The panda challenge has survived adjustments in Chinese language management, the rise of hawkish leaders in Japan, and even an unresolved territorial dispute over the Senkakus , uninhabited islands within the East China sea which can be administered by Japan however claimed by China, the place they're often known as the Diaoyu.

However “panda diplomacy” has met its match in the way forward for Taiwan.

Japan’s conservative prime minister, Sanae Takaichi , has refused to again down on a suggestion she might deploy the self-defence forces within the occasion of an tried Chinese language invasion of Taiwan, which she has mentioned poses an “existential risk” to Japan.

The reportedly unscripted remarks, made earlier than a parliamentary committee in November, drew a livid response from China , which accused Takaichi of interfering in its inner affairs.

Chinese language tourism to Japan has plummeted since Beijing urged its residents to not journey to the nation, whereas cultural exchanges and different occasions geared toward fostering nearer ties have been cancelled or postponed. Now these tensions have seeped into the animal world.

Regardless of requests for replacements from the Tokyo metropolitan authorities, Chinese language authorities have mentioned there are not any plans to ship pandas to take up residence at Ueno Zoo.

“If tensions between Japan and China persist, China might chorus from new loans, and pandas might now not be seen in Japan,” the Beijing Every day, a state-controlled newspaper, quoted a Chinese language professional as saying lately.

Members of the general public fortunate sufficient to have secured tickets to view the pair by way of a massively oversubscribed on-line lottery voiced frustration that the zoo’s lengthy relationship with pandas seems to be over – a minimum of in the intervening time.

Panda souvenirs on the Panda Home at Ueno Zoo. {Photograph}: Justin McCurry/The Guardian “It’s such a disgrace that is the final time I’ll have the ability to see them,” mentioned one lady who had travelled from close by Saitama prefecture. “It appears like we’re being picked on by the Chinese language authorities.”

A thaw in relations that would result in a resumption of panda diplomacy seems unlikely whereas Beijing and Tokyo are locked in a bitter row over the way forward for Taiwan – a self-governing democracy that China regards as a renegade province that can ultimately be reunited with the mainland, by pressure if essential.

“Big pandas operate primarily as symbols of Sino-Japanese friendship moderately than as drivers of bilateral relations,” mentioned Prof Rumi Aoyama, an professional in Japan-China relations at Waseda College in Tokyo.

“Their presence right here doesn’t in itself advance ties, and nor does their return to China undermine them. As an alternative, they function indicators of the broader state of relations between the 2 nations.”

The panda’s purely symbolic function will do little to console Japan’s legions of panda lovers. Greater than 7.6 million folks flocked to Ueno when Kang Kang and Lan Lan, the primary big pandas to be loaned by China, arrived 50 years in the past. Ueno zookeepers have been visibly upset after Ling Ling, a male panda that had lived there since 1992, died in April 2008.

The prospects for a resumption in panda loans – made underneath the Washington Conference on the commerce in endangered species – grew weaker after Takaichi this week referred to as a snap general election for subsequent month.

Her refusal to bend to Chinese language calls for to withdraw her Taiwan remarks have contributed to her high approval ratings – a consider her determination to name an early decrease home election.

“I don’t count on (Takaichi) to take any motion earlier than the election,” Aoyama mentioned. “China has raised the bar by demanding a retraction of her assertion, a situation Japan is unlikely to just accept. Because of this, there may be little room for Japan to make any strikes forward of the election.”

Feelings will probably be operating excessive on Sunday, when the final batch of lottery winners arrive at Ueno to bid the pandas farewell.

The zoo noticed a surge in guests as quickly because the panda’s destiny was introduced final month, with some ready so long as six hours to catch a glimpse of the animals.

Happier instances. Schoolchildren go away the panda home after visiting panda cub Xiang Xiang at Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo in 2017. {Photograph}: Rodrigo Reyes Marin/AFLO/Alamy Since mid-December, entry has been restricted to as much as 4,800 folks a day, and by reservation solely, with a lottery launched to regulate hovering demand throughout the pandas’ last 12 days in Japan.

This week the lottery winners included a lady who mentioned she had fallen in love with the animals after seeing them for the primary time at a zoo close to her residence within the western port metropolis of Kobe.

“I do know the diplomatic scenario is delicate, but it surely’s irritating that pandas have turn out to be combined up in it,” she mentioned. Requested if she would take up the Chinese language international ministry’s invitation to go to the twins of their new residence, she replied. “Completely not.”

Within the background, guests with out lottery tickets queued to have their photographs taken with lifesize fashions of big pandas. Banners of one of many zoo’s star residents gnawing on a bit of bamboo carried a easy message: “Thanks, Xiao Xiao.”